-
lournal of Precision Teaching and Celeration Volume 19, Number 2
Fall 2003
EDITORIAL
1 Editor's Comments
RESEARCH AND APPLICATION ARTICLES
2 The use of self-managed proofreading for detecting and
correcting mechanical errors by students with a learning
disability
Randy L. Seevers, Paul Malanga & John 0. Cooper
19 Using Repeated Readings and Error Correction to Build Reading
Fluency with At Risk Elementary Students
Paul Malanga
28 Celeration of Publication Frequency Michael Lamport
Commons
CHART SHARES
35 The Precision Teaching of Food Acceptance to a Child with
Cerebral Palsy Nicole Bank, Duy Le & Michael Fabrizio
37 Climbing Bottoms Show AAG Malcom Neely
39 Teaching children with autism to engage in play-related talk
Kevin S . Cauley, Jessica A. Brian & Jennifer Snider
AUTHOR GUIDELINES
43 Manuscript Submission Guidelines and Basic and Advanced
Charting Guidelines
ERRATUM
50 DISCUSSION ARTICLES
88 A Review of Edward R. Tufte's "The Visual Display of
Quantitative Information" John W. Eshleman
A Publication of The Standard Celeration Society
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Journal of Precision Teaching and Celera tion Editor: RICHARD M
. KUBINA JR., The Pennsylvania State University - University Park
Associate Editor: CLAY STARLIN, University of Oregon Editorial
Assistants: SHANNON GORMLEY, The Pennsylvania State University -
University Park WILLIAM THERRIEN. The Pennsvlvania State Universitv
- Universitv Park
Board of Consulting Editors DAVID BICARD, Florida International
University THOMAS E. BOYCE, University of Nevada - Reno MICHAEL
LAMPORT COMMONS, Harvard University MICHAEL FABRIZIO, University of
Washington BETH A. GLASBERG, Rutgers University MICHAEL HIXSON,
Central Michigan University DAVID LEE, The Pennsylvania State
University- University Park MORTEN HAUGLAND, Otterbein College PAUL
MALANGA, University of South Dakota CLAIRE ST. PETER, University of
Florida GEORGE M. SUGAI, University of Oregon Past Editors CLAUDIA
MCDADE, (1990-2001), Jacksonville State University PATRICK
MCGREEVY, (1980-1990), Private Practice Honorary Editor for Life
OGDEN LINDSLEY, Kansas University
STATEMENT OF PURPOSE: As the official journal of the Standard
Celeration Society the Journal ofprecision ~eaching and Celeration
has dedicated itself to a science of human behavior founded on a
technology of direct, continuous and standard measurement. This
measurement technology includes: a standard unit of behavior
measurement - frequency; a standard measure of change in behavior
frequencies - celeration; a standard measure of the variability of
behavior frequencies - bounce; and a Standard Celeration Chart to
display frequency, celeration and bounce data. The Standard
Celeration Chart enables chart based statistical procedures to
determine changes in frequency- frequency jumps, changes in
celeration - celeration turns and changes in bounce - bounce verge.
- - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - -
Executive Board of The Standard Celeration Society President:
MICHAEL FABRIZIO Past President: ABIGAIL CALKIN Vice President:
NICHOLAS M. BERENS Secretary: SANDY MACLEOD Treasurer: BRAD
FRIESWYK
The Standard Celeration Society (SCS) publishes the Journal of
Precision Teaching and Celeration (ISSN# 1088-484X) two times a
year. SCS members receive the Journal of Precision Teaching and
Celeration. To join the SCS fill out a membership application
located at the back of the journal. Please send SCS membership to
Brad Frieswyk, SCS Treasurer, PO Box 256643, Chicago, IL
60625-6643. Membership dues: Student - 25.00 yearly membership
includes two issues of the Journal of Precision Teaching and
Celeration and a copy of the Standard Celeration newsletter;
Regular - 50.00 yearly membership includes two issues of the
Journal of Precision Teaching and Celeration and a copy of the
Standard Celeration newsletter; Sustaining - 100.00 yearly
membership includes two issues of the Journal of Precision Teaching
and Celeration, an extra copy of each issue, and a copy of the
Standard Celeration newsletter; Institutional - 90.00 yearly
membership includes two issues of the Journal of Precision Teaching
and Celeration and a copy of the Standard Celeration newsletter. To
join the SCS or order journals with a credit card please visit:
https: / /www.paypal.com . Open an account and choose the "Send
Money Option." Send money to [email protected] . Standard Celeration
Society members please send your change of address or other
membership questions to the Standard Celeration Society treasurer
Brad Frieswick, PO Box 256643, Chicago, IL 60625-6643.
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1 Journal of Precision Teaching and Celeration Volume 19, Number
2 Fall 2003
EDITORIAL
1 Editor's Comments
RESEARCH AND APPLICATION ARTICLES
2 The use of self-managed proofreading for detecting and
correcting mechanical errors by students with a learning
disability
Randy L. Seevers, Paul Malanga & John 0. Cooper
19 Using Repeated Readings and Error Correction to Build Reading
Fluency with At Risk Elementary Students
Paul Malanga
28 Celeration of Publication Frequency Michael Lamport
Commons
CHART SHARES
I 1 35 The Precision Teaching of Food Acceptance to a Child with
Cerebral Palsy
Nicole Bank, D u y Le & Michael Fabrizio
37 Climbing Bottoms Show AAG Malcom Neely
39 Teaching children with autism to engage in play-related talk
Kevin S . Cauley, Jessica A. Brian &Jennifer Snider
AUTHOR GUIDELINES
43 Manuscript Submission Guidelines and Basic and Advanced
Charting Guidelines
ERRATUM
50 Erratum
Printed in Canada
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EDITORIAL
Editor's Comments R. M. Kubina Jr. Editor
At the time of this Journal's printing, a climate exists in
education where researched- based practices receive attention. For
instance, recent legislation such as the No Child Left Behind Act
of 2001 has mandated evidence-based criteria serve as a standard
for judging whether
I programs will receive Federal education funding. Additionally,
the National Research council has
1 published a book entitled Scientific Research in Education
(2002) describing scientific research in
1 education. Evidenced-based, or researched- based, practices
have become exceedingly important as the stakes of educational
outcomes
I shift. Now more than ever before has the job market changed
with an increasing emphasis placed on higher degrees of literacy,
numeracy and "critical thinking" skills. A technically driven
I society requires educational practices to change. The Journal
of Precision Teaching and Celeration has met the call of providing
evidenced-based practices from its inception in 1980. The tradition
continues.
In this issue three applied studies show how Precision Teachers
conduct research and further help explicate specific
evidenced-based practices. Seevers, Malanga and Cooper provide
Standard Celeration Charted data showing a self managed learning
strategy for proofreading by seven students with specific learning
disabilities. Malanga used a repeated readings procedure with an
error correction package to increase reading fluency in three
elementary students at- risk for academic failure. The last
application article, by Commons, offers insight into the
publication history of the author using Standard Celeration
Charting.
Another feature and longstanding tradition for sharing promising
practices, replications, and other research and potential
researched-based practices comes in the form of chart shares. Bank,
Le and Fabrizio share data showing how Precision Teaching helped a
child with cerebral palsy accept food. Another chart share by Neely
explains how application, adduction, and generalization all become
evident in a reading chart for a 6-year-old girl. Cauley, Brian,
and Snider add to the growing evidence that Precision Teaching can
help students with autism. The chart share describes a method for
accelerating play-related talk for two children with autism.
REFERENCES
National Research Council. (2002). Scientific research in
education. Committee on Scientific Principles for Education
Research. Shavelson, R. J., and Towne, L., Editors. Center for
Education. Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and
Education. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGE I
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The use of self-managed proofreading for detecting and
correcting mechanical errors by students with a learning
disability
Randy L. Seevers University of Houston-Clear Lake
Paul Malanga University ofSouth Dakota
John 0 . Cooper The Ohio State University
The purpose of this study was to explore the use of a learning
strategy involving self managed proof- reading by seven students
with specific learning disabilities on their detection and
correction of capi- talization errors, punctuation errors, and
spelling errors. Specifically, this study investigated whether
using self managed proofreading involving a visual prompt and
written cues increased the number of errors detected and the number
of errors corrected on experimenter prepared writing samples during
a one minute counting period. During a no-practice sheet condition,
students were asked to circle all the errors they could find.
During a practice sheet condition, the experimenter modeled how to
proofread for mechanical errors on experimenter prepared practice
sheets and provided students the opportunity to complete the
practice sheet. The self managed proofreading condition followed
the same sequence described above with self managed proofreading
instruction added. An examina- tion of the no practice sheet and
practice sheet data for the students indicated that providing
students practice sheets did not make a difference for six of the
seven students in the number of mechanical errors they were able to
detect. However, the results suggest a functional relationship
between self managed proofreading and improvement in the count of
errors students detect. That is, marked im- provements in the
median count of errors detected by students with learning
disabilities and im- provements in celeration were shown for each
of the seven students in the study.
DESCRIPTORS: Frequency, Self-Managed, Proofreading, Error
Detection
Over the last decade (1993-2003), the edu- cational system in
the United States has taken its share of criticism. Indeed, the
American public has expressed concern in recent years that public
edu- cation has lost touch with the priorities of the pub- lic and
should focus on academic learning (that is, student achievement in
basic skills) as a major goal (Committee for Economic Development,
1995). Reading and writing, two major components of literacy, are
regarded as essential and basic skills that all children need to
function in today's soci- ety. To a large degree, children's
success in school depends on what many associate with literacy
(Howell, Fox, & Morehead, 1993).
Gee (1990) maintains that in today's soci- ety, reflective of a
highly technological culture, people engage less in face to face
interactions; they rely more and more on written types of communi-
cation. Consequently, being able to read and write cannot be
underestimated as an integral part of socializing and life- long
learning in general. In- deed, higher level of literacy will be
expected and demanded as changing economic conditions fur- ther
decrease the number of jobs for workers with low level literacy
skills, while jobs will increase for
better educated workers (Davidson & Koppenhaver, 1993).
Literacy in schools has been viewed in a variety of ways (Beach,
1995). Among them is the view that literacy involves acquiring a
repertoire or set of skills through explicit and systematic in-
struction. Automaticity of reading and writing words underlines
this approach to literacy. Adams (1990) reports an increasing data
base that sup- ports such an instructional approach to literacy,
particularly for students who experience difficulty.
Brown and Campione (1990) suggest that many students with
learning disabilities do not acquire strategies to improve
effectively their writ- ing skills unless detailed and explicit
instruction is provided. Furthermore, self management strat- egies
have been advocated as an approach to pro- mote the acquisition of
academic skills for indi- viduals with disabilities (Glomb &
West, 1990). Martin and Manno (1995) acknowledged the ef-
fectiveness of a self-management procedure used to improve
adolescent students' story composi- tions. Self-management
procedures have also ac- counted for improved writing skills for
students with learning and behavior problems in terms of
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18 2
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completeness, accuracy, and neatness of creative writing
homework assignments (Glomb & West, 1990). An error monitoring
strategy known as COPS, developed in the learning disability insti-
tute at the University of Kansas (Schumaker, Deshler, Alley, &
Warner, 1983), proved beneficial to students with learning
disabilities in the detec- tion and correction of mechanical
errors. Other writing research that indicated self management an
effective tool in helping students improve their writing skills
include Shannon and Polloway's study (1993) in the COPS error
monitoring strat- egy, which proved beneficial to sixth grade stu-
dents participating in the study by helping them focus on the
mechanics of writing. Thus, using an error monitoring strategy,
such as COPS, to help students with learning disabilities become
success- ful and acquire the necessary skills to become com- petent
writers is of great interest.
The advancement of monitoring teacher ef- fectiveness has been
enhanced by Precision Teach- ing. Precision Teaching is a precise
and systematic method of evaluating the effects of instruction. One
of the basic elements of precision teaching is the use of number of
responses per unit of time to monitor the development of fluency
(that is, speed plus accuracy and quality) of a learner's work to a
performance standard (for example, 20 to 25 words per minute for
free writing) (Binder, 1990). Fre- quency (number of errors /unit
of time and num- ber of corrects/unit of time) indicates how well a
student can do a task. In addition, fluency facili- tates
generalization and maintenance of skills, and often has functional
implications as well (for ex- ample, reading a map).
Precision Teaching uses frequent assess- ments of learner
performances and displays those assessment data on Standard
Celeration Charts (Pennypacker, Koenig, & Lindsley, 1972) to
allow teachers to evaluate the effectiveness of instruc- tion
(Binder, 1990). Many precision teachers and their students use
one-minute counting periods when counting and charting performance
(Binder, Haughton, & Van Eyk, 1990).
Although gains have been made in the ef- fectiveness of
instructional methods for other writ- ing aspects (for example,
composing, style) for stu- dents with a learning disability, there
is limited knowledge of the strategies needed to assist stu- dents
to improve their proofreading skills. Self management combined with
specific precision teaching qualities (that is, one-minute
assessments, Standard Celeration Chart) should offer great po-
tential for helping students with a learning dis- ability acquire
proofreading skills.
The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of self
managed proofreading on the de-
tection of capitalization errors, punctuation errors, and
spelling errors. Specifically, this study inves- tigated whether
using self managed proofreading involving a visual prompt and
written cues af- fected the number of mechanical errors detected
and the number of errors corrected by students with a learning
disability.
The following questions were the focus of this study: (a) What
effect will practice sheets have on students' detecting mechanical
errors on experi- menter- prepared writing samples? (b) What ef-
fect will practice sheets have on students' error correction on
experimenter-prepared writing samples? (c) What effect will self
managed proof- reading have on students' detecting mechanical
errors on experimenter prepared writing samples? (d) What effect
will self managed proofreading have on students' error correction
on experimenter prepared writing samples? (e) What effect will self
managed proofreading have on students' main- taining proofreading
skills on experimenter pre- pared writing samples after instruction
has been terminated? (f ) What effect will the use of experi-
menter-prepared writing samples have on the type of mechanical
errors detected by students with learning disabilities over the
course of the study?
METHOD
Participants The experimenter selected seven students
with specific learning disabilities. The specific learning
disabilities were documented by school records (such as grades,
performance in class) and diagnostic testing in accordance with
state guide- lines for student eligibility for special education
services. Criteria for participant selection included: (a) teacher
identification of students who had ex- perienced difficulty in the
mechanics of writing, (b) teacher recommendation that these
students would benefit from error monitoring instruction and self
managed proofreading, and (c) students' willingness and parental
permission to participate in the study. All students participating
in the study were eleven-year old males. Two students were in
fourth grade and five students were in the fifth grade. Two
students were African-American and five students were
Caucasian.
Setting and Materials The study was conducted in an urban
el-
ementary school with an approximate enrollment of 400 students
in grades K-5 located in the midwest. The individualized assessment
and in- structional sessions were held in either of two sepa- rate,
quiet, well lit rooms equipped with a table and three chairs. The
rooms were large enough to
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18 3
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comfortably accommodate the student, the experi- menter, and one
observer. All sessions were con- ducted during the regular school
day in one of the two rooms, depending upon room availability.
The writing samples used in the study con- sisted of 200 to 220
words and contained ten ex- perimenter-selected capitalization
errors, ten ex- perimenter-selected punctuation errors, and ten
experimenter-selected spelling errors. Practice sheets consisted of
90 to 100 words and contained five experimenter-selected
capitalization errors, five experimenter-selected punctuation
errors, and five experimenter-selected spelling errors. In both the
writing samples and practice sheets, the num- ber of errors per
sentence ranged from a high of two errors to a low of zero errors.
Specific errors were randomly inserted in the materials. Table 1
provides a summary of specific errors targeted in the writing
samples. Each writing sample and practice sheet was adapted from a
set of reading materials at a third grade reading level. Each text
was typewritten and double spaced on 8.5" x 11" paper using 12
point New York font.
Dependent Variables The primary dependent variables were the
count of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling errors
correctly and incorrectly detected and cor- rected per minute by
each student on experi- menter prepared materials.
Detected mechanical errors (capitalization, punctuation and
spelling). Detected mechanical er- rors were defined as the
frequency of capitaliza- tion, punctuation, and spelling errors
identified correctly by the student. An answer key was used to
determine the frequency of mechanical
errors detected correctly by the students. To be considered
correct, student marks for a given er- ror matched exactly with the
experimenter's an- swer key.
Types of capitalization errors students were able to detect
include: (a) capital letters not used in the first letter of a
sentence (b) capital letter not used for the pronoun "I", (c)
capital letters not used for names of people, (d) capital letters
not used for titles of people, (e) capital letters not used for the
days of the week (f) capital letters not used for holidays, (g)
capital letters not used for months of the years (h) capital
letters not used for the names of streets, (i) capital letters not
used for the names of cities, and (j) capital letters not used for
the names of states. All other types of capitalization errors (that
is, names of countries, oceans, rivers, mountains, landmarks,
titles of books) were ex- cluded from this study.
Types of punctuation errors students were able to detect
include: period not used after (a) a statement, (b) an initial, (c)
an abbreviation, (d) question mark not used after a question, (e)
excla- mation point not used after an exclamation or a command that
exclaims, (f) comma not used to separate names of cities and
states, and (g) comma not used to separate day numbers and years.
All other types of punctuation errors (that is, commas in a series,
commas to set off words in dialogue, apostrophes in all forms) were
excluded from this study.
Types of spelling errors students were able to detect include
(a) omission of letters (for ex- ample, "mes age" for "message"),
(b) reversal of letters (for example, "recieve" for "receive"), and
(c) insertion of letters (for example, "tommorrow"
Table 1 Specific Errors Targeted
Capitalization Punctuation Spelling
Beginning of sentence Names of people Pronoun "I" Days of week
Months of year Special days Names of streets Names of cities Names
of states Titles of people
Period at end of sentence Omission of letter(s) Period after
abbreviation Reversal of letter(s) Period after an initial
Insertion of letter(s) Question mark after question Comma between
date and year Comma between city and state Exclamation point after
command
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18 4
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for "tomorrow"). Misidentifi'ed mechanical errors
(capitalization,
punctuation, and spelling). Misidentified mechani- cal errors
were defined as the frequency of capi- talization, punctuation, and
spelling errors misidentified by the student. A misidentified er-
ror was considered as such when the student iden- tified an error
when in fact there was not one. The same answer key used to
determine detected me- chanical errors was used to determine the
fre- quency of errors misidentified by the students.
Errors corrected and not corrected. Student er- ror corrections
were defined as the total count of mechanical errors per minute the
student accu- rately corrected after proofreading for capitaliza-
tion, punctuation, and spelling errors. An answer key was used to
determine the accuracy of cor- rected mechanical errors by the
students. To be considered correct, student corrections for a given
error matched exactly the experimenter's answer key.
Student errors not corrected were defined as the count of
mechanical errors per minute the student failed to correct
accurately after proofread- ing for capitalization, punctuation,
and spelling errors. If the student correction for a given error
did not match exactly with the experimenter's an- swer key, the
student's response was considered as a failure to correct a
detected error.
Measurement of the Dependent Variables Experimenter prepared
writing samples. A
new experimenter prepared writing sample for students to
proofread for capitalization, punctua- tion, and spelling errors
was distributed to stu- dents for each day of the study. The same
new passage was used by all the students in attendance for any
given day. Each writing sample was de- veloped from stories below
or equal to the student's current reading level. The readability
level was controlled to uphold findings that stu- dents'
proofreading performances may be a func- tion of exposure to
self-managed proofreading instruction, rather than limited reading
skills. Each writing sample consisted of 200 to 220 words and
contained 10 experimenter selected capitalization errors, 10
experimenter selected punctuation er- rors, and 10 experimenter
selected spelling errors. Each passage contained more errors than
the stu- dent could possibly detect in a one minute timing period
as determined by adult proofreaders. The adult proofreaders used in
this study (two gradu- ate students) detected a count of 19 and 21
errors per minute.
Students were given a new writing sample each day to proofread
for each type of mechanical error. In a one minute timing, the
students were
required to proofread for errors in the writing sample and
indicate (by circling) all the errors de- tected. After the
one-minute timing, the students then had the opportunity to correct
the errors de- tected.
Inter-observer Agreement and Accuracy of Measure- men t
Before the start of the study, the experi- menter trained an
independent observer to obtain interobserver agreement. The
training sessions consisted of the experimenter describing the pur-
pose of the study, explaining and giving examples of the definition
for detected and misidentified mechanical errors and detected
errors corrected and not corrected, practicing with the independent
observer the marking and scoring procedures, and conducting several
pilot sessions using samples from two students not participating in
the study. The experimenter and observer independently checked each
student's permanent product on the dependent variables. The trained
observer inde- pendently scored and recorded the dependent
variables a minimum of 20% of all sessions. Stu- dent products were
randomly selected by the trained observer for scoring and
recording. The experimenter was not informed of which days the
trained observer selected for interobserver agree- ment. Percentage
of agreement for each dependent variable measurement ranged from
97-100 % for all students. An answer by answer comparison of the
scored products with discrepancies by the ex- perimenter and
observer to the true value answer keys was conducted for the
assessment of accu- racy measurement of the dependent variables
(Johnston & Pennypacker, 1993). All inaccurate measurements
were corrected and the correct counts reported in the results.
Procedural Integrity To assess the consistent application of
the
procedures for each phase of the study, procedural checklists
containing the scope and sequence of the experimental design were
developed and used to verify the implementation of the procedures.
An observer completed the checklist for 20% of all ses- sions. If
discrepancies arose between the checklist and the observed
procedures, the observer dis- cussed the discrepancies with the
experimenter. Before beginning the study, the experimenter con-
ducted two pilot sessions so the observer would have an opportunity
to practice using the form. Procedural integrity was reported as
the percent- age of adherence to each of the procedural check-
lists. During the no practice sheet condition, the experimenter
adhered to the procedural checklist for all students 100% of the
time. During the prac-
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18 5
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tice sheet condition, the experimenter adhered to the procedural
checklist 97-100%. During the self managed proofreading condition,
the experi- menter followed established procedures 100% of the time
for all students.
Experimental Design and Procedures A multiple baseline design
across students
(Cooper, Heron & Heward, 1987) was employed to analyze the
effects of self managed proofread- ing on the frequency of
mechanical errors detected and misidentified by the student, and
the fre- quency of errors corrected and not corrected by the
student. Implementation of each experimen- tal change was based
upon charted data and its relation to an established decision rule.
A visual analysis of the data charted on the Standard Celeration
Chart (Pennypacker, Koenig, & Lindsley, 1972) was used to
determine when a phase change would be made. In this study, the
criterion used was four consecutive days of data where the minimum
celeration line multiplied by less than x1.25.
Pre-Baseline Ins truct ion. During the pre baseline instruction
phase, the experimenter pro- vided individual instruction in the
mechanics of writing (that is, capitalization, punctuation, and
spelling) for each student participating in the study. The
objectives of the instruction were for each student to orally
recall ten rules for using capi- tal letters, to orally recall
seven rules for correct punctuation (including when to use a
period, a question mark, an exclamation point, and com- mas), and
to orally recall three types of common spelling errors. Each
instructional session was con- ducted within a 15 minute period,
and began with a two to three 3 minute warm up /rapport build- ing
discussion.
N o Practice Sheets. Sitting next to the stu- dent at the table,
the experimenter prepared the student for a one minute counting
period. The ex- perimenter prepared in advance the day's writing
sample. During the one minute counting period, the student
proofread the experimenter prepared writing sample for mechanical
errors. At the be- ginning of each one minute counting period, the
experimenter set the timer and gave scripted di- rections to the
student. At the end of the counting period, the experimenter asked
the student to mark the place in the passage where he stopped
proofreading and the experimenter then termi- nated the
proofreading session by providing the appropriate cue. The student
was then permitted to detect and correct new errors after the
assess- ment was completed, although these data were not reported.
When the student finished, the experi- menter provided the student
nonspecific praise as
well as commented on the number of correct er- rors detected and
the number of errors corrected accurately. The experimenter ended
the session for the day by thanking the student and returning him
to class.
Practice Sheets. Sitting next to the student at the table, the
experimenter instructed the stu- dent in exactly the same way as
described in the no practice sheet condition, except that specific
practice sheet instruction was added. During in- struction, the
experimenter followed a script. Once the student signaled that he
had completed the practice sheet, the experimenter instructed the
stu- dent to correct all the errors detected in the prac- tice
sheet. The experimenter then provided non- specific feedback to the
student upon completion (for example, good job, well done, thanks).
In ad- dition to nonspecific feedback, the experimenter commented
on the number of correct errors the student detected and the number
of errors cor- rected accurately. Next, the experimenter pre- pared
the student for a one minute counting pe- riod as outlined in the
no practice sheet condition.
Self Managed Proofreading. After four con- secutive days of data
where the minimum celeration line multiplied by less than x1.25, a
self management strategy was introduced. The experi- menter
instructed the student in exactly the same manner and sequence as
described in the practice sheet condition with the self management
strat- egy added. The experimenter reminded the stu- dent to use
the self management strategy each time he was asked to proofread
the experimenter pre- pared practice sheets and the experimenter
pre- pared writing samples.
The self management strategy included two steps. First, the
student was instructed to write the letters CPS (for
capitalization, punctuation, spelling) at the top of each practice
sheet / writing sample once the practice sheetlwriting sample had
been distributed. The student was then told that each letter was to
help remind him of the types of errors to look for when
proofreading each sen- tence.
Second, the experimenter instructed the student to write at the
end of each sentence the corresponding letters for the types of
error (C for capitalization, P for punctuation, and S for spell-
ing) he was proofreading. The experimenter pro- vided corrective
feedback to the student on his use of the self management strategy
only if he failed to implement the self management strategy cor-
rectly.
Generality Probe. In order to assess the af- fect of the
intervention procedure to students' own writing assignments, the
classroom teacher col- lected writing samples from each student
two
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18 6
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times a week. As part of their seatwork, students had as much
time as they wanted in class to proof- read their own completed
stories for mechanical errors.
Maintenance. Following intervention, maintenance measurements
were collected on the count of mechanical errors detected, the
count of misidentified mechanical errors, the count of me- chanical
errors corrected accurately, and the count of failures to correct
detected mechanical errors by asking students to proofread
experimenter pre- pared writing samples. Definitions and procedures
for the maintenance probes were identical to those used during the
no practice sheet condition.
RESULTS
Assessment of Errors Detected Charts one through seven depict
the error
detection data for each student in the study. Dur- ing the no
practice sheet and practice sheet condi- tions, the individual
median scores for the num- ber of errors detected in the one-minute
counting period by a student ranged from zero errors to three
errors. For six of the seven students, the prac- tice sheet made
little difference in the number of errors the students detected.
For Tray, the practice sheet did appear to have some effect. His
median score for the number of errors detected increased from zero
mechanical errors detected in a one- minute counting period to
three detected in a minute. Following instruction in self-managed
proofreading, all students showed improvement in the number of
errors they were able to detect. Individual median scores for the
number of errors detected by a student ranged from six to nine er-
rors. The individual median scores during the maintenance phase
differed little from the self- managed proofreading condition. The
individual median scores ranged from five to nine errors de-
tected.
Assessment of Misidentified Errors Charts one through seven also
display the
misidentified error data for each student in the study. For five
out of the seven students, the indi- vidual median scores for the
number of misidentified errors in the one-minute counting period
remained the same throughout all condi- tions of the study. The
individual scores of these five students ranged from zero to two
errors misidentified. For Winston, the median score for the number
of misidentified errors in the one- minute counting period (that
is, one) was slightly higher during the no practice sheet condition
than during the other conditions of the study. Other- wise,
Winston's median score remained constant
during the other conditions. Winston's misidentified errors
ranged from zero to three. For Kent, the median score for the
number of misidentified errors increased from two during the no
practice sheet condition to the median score count of three in the
practice sheet condition. The median count of misidentified errors
decreased to zero as a result of introducing self-managed proof-
reading.
Celerations of the Errors Detected Celeration courses are
indicated on the stu-
dents' charts to describe how rapidly students im- proved (that
is, the amount of learning) in the numbers of errors detected in
each condition. Dur- ing the no practice sheet condition, the
celeration multiplied by 1.0 for all students. During the prac-
tice sheet condition, the celeration multiplied by 1.0 for all
students except Tray. The celeration for Tray multiplied by 2.3.
During the self-managed proofreading condition, the celeration
multiplied by 1.2 for Mark, 1.9 for Jesse, 2.3 for James, Tray, and
Winston, 2.6 for Ali, and 15.0 for Kent. Dur- ing maintenance, the
celeration multiplied by 1.0 for all students.
J u m p s and Turns w i t h Errors detected and Misidentified
Errors
Charts one through seven show two stu- dents jumped up in count
of errors detected when experimental conditions changed from no
practice sheet to practice sheet. A no turn celeration pat- tern
emerged for Winston's count of errors de- tected. A turn up
celeration pattern developed for Tray's count of errors detected.
The remaining five students produced a no jump and no celeration
pattern in the count of errors detected as compared in the no
practice sheet condition to the practice sheet condition.
All students jumped up in counts of errors detected when
experimental conditions changed from practice sheet to self-managed
proofreading. Six of the seven students' celeration courses turned
up. Tray's celeration course produced a no turn celeration.
In terms of the count of misidentified er- rors, five of the
seven students produced no jump and no turn patterns across all
changes in experi- mental conditions. Two of the students, however,
had changes in performance and learning in the count of
misidentified errors. Winston produced a jump down and Kent
produced a jump up pat- tern when experimental conditions changed
from the no practice sheet condition to practice sheet condition.
During the change from practice sheet to self-managed proofreading,
Winston's count of misidentified errors remained the same (that
is,
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showing a no jump pattern) while Kent's count of misidentified
errors produced a jump down pat- tern.
DISCUSSION
An examination of the no practice sheet and practice sheet data
for the students indicates that providing students practice sheets
did not appear to make a difference for six of the seven students
in the number of mechanical errors they were able to detect in a
minute. For these six stu- dents, the median count of errors
detected showed little variability as compared between the two ex-
perimental conditions. Further evidence that the introduction of
practice sheets did not improve students' performances was
indicated by the celeration lines for each of these six students. A
x1.0 celeration was reported for each of these six students,
indicating no changes in learning. Al- though there was a slight
jump up for Mark and Winston in the number of errors detected
between the two conditions, it was not seen as an impor- tant
difference and there was no turn up in celeration. For Tray,
however, there was a change in learning as a function of
introducing practice sheets. Tray exceeded his median score of the
num- ber of errors detected in one minute by 3. Further, a x2.3
celeration was produced, indicating Tray did indeed more than
double his learning, before reaching a plateau. It is not clear,
however, what produced this change since there was no oppor- tunity
for verification (that is, practice sheets were introduced to all
students except Ali at the same time, thus the practice sheet
condition served as a baseline condition).
In general, the number of errors students corrected during the
practice sheet condition did not vary from the no practice sheet
condition. In addition, the performance of six of the seven stu-
dents showed celerations of x1.0 for both condi- tions of the
study, indicating no improvement. For Mark and Winston, the median
count of errors cor- rected did jump up slightly between the two
con- ditions, but it was not an important difference and there was
no turn up in celeration.
The results of this study suggest a func- tional relationship
between self managed proof- reading and improvement in the count of
errors students detect. For all seven students, the median count of
errors detected was substantially higher during the self managed
proofreading condition. Initial celerations from a low of x1.2 to a
high of x15.0 were obtained before student performances leveled
out. These data clearly indicate that in- struction in self managed
proofreading improved the count of error detections by students
with a
learning disability. The overall effectiveness of self managed
proofreading lends support to research suggesting that
verbally-mediated strategies em- ploying a self management
component (Danoff, Harris, & Graham, 1993; MacArthur, Schwartz,
& Graham, 1991) are effective in improving the aca- demic
behaviors of students with learning disabili- ties. The results
support other studies that dem- onstrated that self instruction and
providing ex- tra prompts may help students with learning dis-
abilities focus attention on what has to be accom- plished (Graham,
Harris & Reid, 1992; Schunk, 1985). That is, writing CPS at the
top of the paper and after each sentence serves as a reminder of
what the student is to do. Furthermore, self man- aged proofreading
provides students guided prac- tice and requires that students
apply known rules, perhaps explaining in part the overall
effective- ness of the instruction.
Results from the present study also docu- ment a low frequency
of incorrect responses (that is, opportunities for students to
misidentify an er- ror) for the majority of students. Indeed, the
fre- quency of misidentified errors rarely exceeded 1 or 2 per
minute for all students except Winston and Kent across all
conditions. For Winston, the frequency of misidentified errors
exceeded three during the no practice sheet condition but de-
creased in subsequent conditions. For Kent, how- ever, the
frequency of misidentified errors was an influential variable
during the no practice sheet and practice sheet conditions of the
study, and the number of misidentified errors significantly de-
creased with the introduction of self managed proofreading.
The collection of data on student perfor- mances suggests a
functional relationship between self managed proofreading and the
count of error corrections. Marked improvements in the median count
of errors detected by students with learn- ing disabilities and
improvements in celeration were shown for each of the seven
students in the study. Such findings are consistent with earlier
studies (Reynolds, Hill, Swassing, & Ward, 1988; Shannon &
Polloway, 1993) that describe some monitoring procedures as
effective strategies to revise and correct writing mistakes.
The data from this study are inconclusive regarding the effect
of self-managed proofreading and students maintaining proofreading
skills. There was not sufficient time in the study to col- lect
more than three days of data during the main- tenance condition,
thus there were not enough data to make a projection on the effects
of self- managed proofreading and students maintaining proofreading
skills. All participants, however, con- tinued to use self managed
proofreading to detect
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
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and correct mechanical errors in the experimenter prepared
writing samples after all intervention procedures had been
terminated.
Actual changes in the type of errors de- tected over the course
of the study were assessed by analyzing the percentage of each
error type detected in each condition. The types of error with the
highest percentage of detection for each con- dition were then
compared to one another. Results reveal there were changes across
conditions for four of the seven students in the type of errors
detected, that is, no patterns emerged. Two stu- dents consistently
detected a higher than or equal to percentage of punctuation errors
across all three conditions, while one student detected a higher
percentage of capitalization errors across all three
conditions.
Several limitations of this study need to be addressed. First,
the participants in this study were seven male students with
specific learning disabili- ties. Two of the students were African
American and the other five were Caucasian; two of the stu- dents
were fourth graders and the other five were fifth graders. All of
the students received part of their instruction in a resource room
designed to meet their individual needs in a large urban el-
ementary school. It is not known to what extent the generality of
effects of the error detection and error correction results would
be across students of different ages and skill level, of different
gen- der, of different races, and of different socioeco- nomic
levels.
Second, students were taken out of their resource or regular
classes to work individually with the experimenter in a separate
area of the school in one of two rooms. To what extent the academic
environment and the occasional special events (e.g., field trip,
school assembly, classroom party) influenced the outcomes is
unknown.
Third, the study was conducted over a course of 9 weeks (40
sessions). Consequently, there was not enough time available to
collect ex- tended maintenance data. Further, a more strin- gent
evaluation of self managed proofreading may be strengthened by
implementing the study at the beginning or middle of a school year,
rather than toward the end of one.
Fourth, the writing samples used were se- lected from
supplemental materials and may have some grade level variability.
It cannot be assumed that similar results would result if the
students used different materials. Since error detection and error
correction only required the students to iden- tify three kinds of
errors, what students were re- acting to is not exactly certain.
Moreover, all the writing samples were neatly typed. Further re-
search is needed to determine whether the out
comes of this experiment has generality with other instructional
materials and with student generated passages.
Fifth, during the course of the study, the classroom teacher
made every attempt to collect writing samples from each student two
times a week. However, other classroom demands, spe- cial events,
and time constraints did not always permit the teacher to follow
through on collecting the weekly writing samples for each student.
In addition, the teacher did not follow a standard pro- cedure when
instructing students to proofread their papers. Sometimes students
were given the assignment as part of their seatwork, other times it
was done one on one with the teacher. For the most part, students
were given as much time as they wanted in class to proofread their
own com- pleted stories for mechanical errors, therefore no record
of frequency counts were obtainable.
Finally, only two days of maintenance data for Ali and Kent and
three days of maintenance data for each of the other students were
collected in the study. The limited number of days with maintenance
data made it difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions in
regards to maintenance of skills over any extended period of
time.
Movement toward integrating students with special problems into
regular education class- rooms has created a major trend toward
classroom based intervention (Gerber, 1993). The effects of self
managed proofreading on error detection and error correction were
evaluated in a setting that was not like the environment in which
the students received their primary instruction. Particularly
useful would be effective strategies that could gen- eralize to
other settings, thus, the need for this study to be replicated in
other environments is warranted. The question of whether self
managed proofreading is indeed effective in general educa- tion or
resource environments is an intriguing one and continued
examination of how self managed proofreading can be applied to
varied settings will be needed. In addition, all the students in
this study received individually administered instruc- tions.
Investigations of group administered in- structions, typical of
general education classrooms, may provide additional insight on the
effective- ness of self managed proofreading.
Furthermore, attention should be given to the question of
whether self managed proofread- ing is effective on student
generated assignments. Of considerable interest would be the effect
of self managed proofreading and the transfer to other types of
writing assignments (e.g., journals, science logs, personal
correspondence).
In addition, it is not known from this study what performance
frequencies could be achieved
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
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if students were to set aims. Further investigations need to
explore appropriate aims on detecting and correcting errors and
extend the relationship of these performance rates to eventual
generalization and subsequent skill development.
Finally, other areas of research that warrant further
exploration because of the potential im- pact for improving error
detection and error cor- rection of students with specific learning
disabili- ties include public posting of daily performance scores,
self-charting, and various error correction procedures.
CONCLUSION
The results of the study indicate that these seven students with
specific learning disabilities were able to increase the count of
errors detected and the count of errors corrected on experimenter-
prepared writing samples through self-managed proofreading. The
medians, celerations, and per- formance changes suggest that a
functional rela- tionship among the count of errors detected and
the count of errors corrected and self-managed proofreading
instruction occurred for all students.
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Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (1987). Applied
behavior analysis. Columbus, OH: Merrill.
Danoff, B., Harris, K. R., & Graham, S. (1993). In-
corporating strategy instruction within the writing process in the
regular classroom: Effects on the writing of students with and
without learning disabilities. Journal of Reading Behavior, 25 (3),
295-322.
Davidson, J., & Koppenhaven, D. (1993). Adoles- cent
literacy: What works and why (2nd ed.). New York: Garland
Publishing, Inc.
Gee, J. P. (1990). Social linguistics and literacies: Ideology
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Gerber, A. (1993). Language related learning dis- abilities.
Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Pub- lishing Co., Inc.
Glomb, N. & West, R. (1990). Teaching behavior- ally
disordered adolescents to use self man- agement skill for improving
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Beach, S. A. (1995). Defining literacy: Implications Graham, S.,
Harris, K. R., & Reid, R. (1992). Devel- for reading
instruction. Reading Psychol- oping self regulated learners. Focus
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Binder, C. (1990). Precision teaching and curricu- lum based
assessment. Journal ofPrecision Teaching, 8/33-35.
Binder, C., Haughton, E., & Van Eyk, D. (1990). Increasing
endurance and building flu- ency: Precision teaching attention
span. Teaching Exceptional Children, 22(3), 24- 27.
Brown, A. L., & Campione, J.C. (1990). Interactive learning
environments and the teaching of science and mathematics. In M.
Gardner, J. Greens, F. Reif, A. Schoenfeld, A. di Sessa, & E.
Stage (Eds.), Toward a scientific prac- tice of science education
(pp. 111-139). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Committee for Economic Development (1995). Putting learning
first: Governing and man- aging the schools for high
achievement.
Howell, K. W., Fox, S. L., & Morehead, M. K. (1993).
Curriculum based evaluation: Teaching and decision making (2nd
ed.), Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks / Cole.
MacArthur, C., Schwartz, S., & Graham, S. (1991). Effects of
reciprocal peer revision strategy in a special education classroom.
Leavning Disabilities Research and Practice, 6, 201 - 210.
Martin, K. F., & Manno, C. (1995). Use of a check off system
to improve middle school stu- dents' story compositions. Journal of
Learning Disabilities, 28(3), 139-149.
Pennypacker, H. S., Koenig, C. H., & Lindsley, O.R. (1972).
The handbook of the standard be- havior chart. Kansas City, KS:
Behavior Research Co.
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Reynolds, C. J., Hill, D. S., Swassing, R. H., &Ward, M. E.
(1988). The effects of revision strategy instruction on the writing
performance of students with learning disabilities.fourna1 of
Learning Disabilities, 21(9), 540-545.
Schumaker, J., Deshler, D. D., Alley, G., & Warner, M.
(1983). Toward the development of an intervention model for
learning disabled adolescents: The University of Kansas In-
stitute. Exceptional Education Quarterly. 4, 45-74.
Schunk, D. (1985). Participation in goal setting: Effects on
self efficacy and skills of learn- ing disabled children. Journal
of Special Education, 19,307-317.
Shannon, T. R., & Polloway, E. A. (1993). Promot- ing error
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JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 2-18
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Using Repeated Readings and Error Correction to Build Reading
Fluency with At Risk Elementary Students*
Paul Malanga University of South Dakota
A repeated readings procedure was used simultaneously with an
error correction package that in- cluded modeling, prompting, and
chaining procedures to increase reading fluency in three elemen-
tary students at risk for academic failure. An analysis of
celerations and learning pictures common to Precision Teaching
programs was used to evaluate the change of correctly and
incorrectly read words across one-minute timing periods. The design
was an A-B experimental design. The dependent vari- ables included
the frequency, celeration and bounce within and across conditions
(i.e., passages) for both correct and incorrect performances.
During baseline, students read between 55-69 correct words per
minute. All participant's experienced substantial improvements in
reading fluency with the in- troduction of the repeated readings
and error correction package. Improvements sustained even when
substantial breaks in instruction occurred, thereby demonstrating
the robust nature of repeated read- ings at maintaining reading
fluency. Upon introduction of the repeated readings and error
correction procedure, jump-ups occurred in correctly read words per
minute ranging from 9 and 25 words. Terminal performance within and
across conditions varied and is discussed.
DESCRIPTORS: At-risk, Fluency, Reading Instruction, Repeated
Readings, and Precision Teaching
Reading and comprehending what is read is crucial to success in
school. In fact, becoming a successful reader is key to success
with life. As early as fourth grade the demands of reading in-
crease dramatically. The reason is two-fold. First, learning begins
to rely more on textbooks that are expository in nature. Second,
the context becomes less familiar and more specialized (Allington,
2002). Failure to remediate reading difficulties can have a
substantial effect on a student's ability to learn new, more
complex, information. For ex- ample, Juel (1988) found that
students classified as poor readers in grade 1, without intensive
remediation, are likely to remain so classified in grade 4. The
Carnegie Corporation exemplifies the need for early identification
and remediation in a recent report. The report surveyed students
enter- ing high school in the 35 largest cities in the US. Half of
the students surveyed were found to read at or below the sixth
grade level (Vacca, 2002).
Historically, a 95-97 percent accuracy level was viewed as
sufficient for comprehension. How- ever, with this level of
accuracy, students reading a book at their "instructional reading
level" may skip five words of every 100 read (Allington, 2002).
Accuracy, while a necessary condition for compre- hension, is not a
sufficient condition. For instance, a student may read 50 words
with no errors but take 5 minutes to do so. While the reader accu-
rately read each word, such a sufficient amount of his attention
was consumed with decoding tasks, that little meaning would likely
be gleaned from the passage (Hempenstall, 1999). The reader may
be accurate, but not fluent. Fluency then, is another critical
aspect in comprehending text.
The term "mastery" is closely related to the term "fluency".
Mastery is commonly used to re- fer to the achievement of a certain
level of perfor- mance normally expected from the best learners
(Dick & Carey, 1996). While mastery implies a cer- tain level
of performance accuracy, it does not in- clude a rate or speed
dimension. When a standard temporal dimension is allotted for each
perfor- mance ( e g , 1-minute) and empirically validated
performance aims are used to define mastery, flu- ent performance
is the result. A fluent skill is one that occurs automatically,
without hesitation, and with a high degree of accuracy. Formally
defined, fluency is the fluid combination of accuracy plus speed
(Binder, 1996). Fluent reading then, is read- ing that occurs
quickly and without hesitation with few errors (Teigen, Malanga,
& Sweeney, 2001).
The ability to decode words and read flu- ently are prerequisite
to understanding the infor- mation in a text (McCormick, 1995).
Without flu- ent reading skills, the acquisition of a general
knowledge base, such as civics, history, and sci- ence, is likely
to be hindered (Teigen, Malanga, & Sweeney, 2001). A well
informed citizenry requires the accumulation of "intellectual
capital", or, a com-
*Correspondence concerning this manuscript may be addressed to:
Paul R. Malanga, University of South Dakota, Delzell Education
Center, 414 E. Clark Street, Vermillion, SD 57069.
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
2,2003, PAGES 19-27
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mon core of background knowledge to effectively communicate
(Hirsch, 1996). In short, background knowledge is intellectual
capital and, without flu- ent reading skills, the acquisition of
background knowledge is severely hindered. Simply stated, students
with fluent reading skills can recall what they read, which is the
main point of reading (McCormick, 1995). Repeated readings is one
pro- cedure that has been shown to be effective at de- veloping
fluent reading (Samuels, 2002).
Repeated readings is a procedure that re- quires readers to read
and reread a passage mul- tiple times to develop fluent reading
performance (Samuals, 2002). A number of studies have vali- dated
the efficacy of the repeated readings proce- dure on the
acquisition of fluent reading perfor- mance (Bolich & Sweeney,
1996; Brosovich- McGurr, 1991; Carroll, McCormick, & Cooper,
1991; Herman, 1985; O'Shea, Sindelar, & O'Shea, 1985; Polk
& Miller, 1994; Teigen, et al., 2001). Re- peated readings,
combined with Precision Teach- ing daily charting of performance,
has been shown to be an effective means of establishing fluent
read- ing within a relatively short period of time. Preci- sion
teaching is a process of direct observational measurement that
combines daily assessment probes and charting to monitor student
perfor- mance.
Precision Teaching is guided by two pri- mary assumptions: a)
for students to remember, transfer, and generalize a skill across
settings, they must be fluent, and b) need for a standardized sys-
tem of monitoring, displaying, and making deci- sions about student
performance (Witt & Beck, 1999). Charting data on a standard
chart is an easy and convenient way to formatively assess student
progress and provides an accurate method of com- paring within and
across student performances.
Teigen, et al., (2001) assessed the effect of repeated readings,
an error correction package and daily charting on the acquisition
of fluent reading performance with a fourth grade special needs
stu- dent. At the beginning of each reading episode, the passage to
be read was previewed and diffi- cult words reviewed prior to the
initial one-minute timing. Subsequent to the initial timing,
additional instruction was provided for difficult portions of the
text via modeling, prompting, paired reading, chaining, and the
neurological impress method. Three additional timings were
conducted with the best performance charted. Results showed imme-
diate and substantial improvement in reading flu- ency. The number
of correctly read words im- proved by 140 words per minute with
only 36 min- utes of instruction. While the instructional pack- age
provided a convincing demonstration of the effectiveness of
repeated readings, limitations
exist. One of the limitations of the Teigen, et al.,
study was the sheer number of corrective proce- dures included
in the error correction package (5). It is unknown whether all
components or only some components are necessary to produce the
substantive gains demonstrated by Teigen, et al. Could fewer
components produce just as effective results? The current study was
designed to answer this question. The study examined the effects of
repeated readings on the acquisition of fluent oral reading
performance with three at risk elementary students. The study
systematically replicated the Teigen, et al., study using only
three components of their error correction package: modeling,
prompting, and chaining.
METHOD
After initially previewing the passage with the instructor to
correct any initial reading prob- lems, the participants were told
that it was time for their repeated readings. To complete the re-
peated readings procedure, the instructor told the students to read
as much of the passage as pos- sible in a minute. The students were
told to skip words they could not pronounce. The text chosen was
determined to be challenging based on each student's baseline
performance.
The repeated readings procedure involved five steps: a)
previewing the text for difficult words and reviewing those words
prior to the reading episode, b) directing the learner to read as
much as they can in 1-minute, c) subsequent to the tim- ing,
providing remediation as necessary in the form of modeling,
prompting, and chaining, and d) conducting two follow-up 1-minute
assess- ments.
After previewing the passage, the experi- menter stated, "Read
as much of the passage as you can in a minute. Ready, begin". A
timer on a Casio wrist watch (Model W-71) was used for all timings.
At the conclusion of each 1-minute tim- ing, the number of correct
and incorrectly read words was counted. The procedure was repeated
twice and the best performance was charted.
Subjects Three second grade students identified as
at risk for failure were referred by their teachers for
additional reading instruction. In one students case, placing him
at risk for formal referral to spe- cial education. Substantial
reading and compre- hension deficits of grade level texts were
identi- fied as the primary factor impeding their devel- opment
through the scope and sequence of the cur- riculum.
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Setting All instructional sessions took place in a
room reserved for IEP and other formal meetings. The room
contained a circular table and three chairs. A full room divider
separated the instruc- tional setting from the other half of the
room, which was occasionally used concurrently for in- struction
with other students.
Independent and Dependent Variables The independent variable was
the re-
peated readings and error correction package. The dependent
variable was oral reading, specifically, the number of correctly
and incorrectly read words per minute. An incorrect is defined as
an omission, substitution, mispronunciation, or self-correction. A
correct is defined as one-to-one correspondence between the word
read and the printed word.
Materials The passages were selected from future sto-
ries from the grade level anthologies. Since the class had not
yet read the passages, these were selected to enhance the
likelihood of generaliza- tion and success in the classroom. The
scope and sequence of the curriculum dictated the sequence in which
the stories were introduced. The specific stories used were Emma's
Dragon Hunt (O'Connor & Hamanaka, 1990), Molly the Brave
(Rylant & Gammell, 1993), and The Relatives Came (Stock,
1987).
Design The experimental design used was an
analysis of celerations and learning pictures com- mon to
Precision Teaching programs. The primary dependent variable
dimensions analyzed were fre- quency level and celeration changes
within and across condition (i.e., passages) for both correct and
incorrect performances. This design incorporates a trend analysis
model which is designed to iden- tify repeated patterns of behavior
(e.g., acquisition rates, level changes, bounce) under given
circum- stances.
Conditions Baseline: During baseline, the storyline of
the passages was discussed, the passage was pre- viewed, and a
1-minute timing was conducted. While only one datum constitutes the
baseline, any additional timings would have constituted a form of
practice and would have been considered an instance of repeated
reading. The student's initial performance is the truest measure of
baseline for this type of procedure.
Repeated Readings: The repeated readings
procedure was implemented using the procedure outlined above
with modeling and chaining as error strategies used as necessary.
Modeling con- sisted of the experimenter reading the word cor-
rectly and requiring the learner to re-read the word properly.
Chaining consisted of the experimenter modeling the difficult
passage once while the learner followed along then requiring the
learner to re-read the passage until it could be read at least once
without hesitation.
15" Sprint: Due to the maintaining trend in Merrit's performance
when reading Emma's Dragon Hunt (Stock, 1987) a 15" sprint
condition was instituted. A section of the passage was func-
tioning as a fluency blocker in that Merrit was ex- periencing
difficulty decoding some of the words. Modeling and one 15" sprint
was used to mitigate the difficulty Merrit was experiencing with
this section of the passage. The repeated reading pro- cedure
immediately followed the 15" sprint.
Untimed Reading: For one student, Cory, an untimed reading
condition was incorporated as a result of consecutive days of flat
performance. During untimed readings, Cory read the passage once
with prompting and error correction strate- gies being used as
necessary. Subsequent to the untimed reading, the repeated reading
procedure was used and the best performance was charted.
RESULTS
All students improved their reading per- formance when repeated
readings was instituted. In Merrit's case, he literally improved
his perfor- mance with each minute of practice.
Merrit During baseline, Merrit correctly read 59
wpm with six errors. Overall, while reading Emma's Dragon Hunt
(Stock, 1987) Merrit's per- formance shows an accelerating trend
for correctly read words and a maintaining trend for incorrectly
read words. Specifically, Merritt's overall celeration of the
number of correctly read words was X1.25. Merrit's frequency of
correctly read words im- proved from 59 / 6 to 179 / 0 across 12
sessions, rep- resenting a frequency jump of X3.
For the passage Molly the Brave (O'Connor, et al., 1990), across
12 minutes of in- struction and practice the number of correctly
read words accelerated by X1.8 while Merrit's learning
opportunities remained stable at XI. Merrit's per- formance
improved with each minute he prac- ticed.
The introduction of The Relatives Came (Rylant, et al., 1993)
produced a jump-down-turn- up in the number of correctly read words
with a
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CALENDAR WEEKS Figure 1 : Merrit's Correct and Incorrect Oral
Reading Performance
l UUU
100
10
1
.1
.01
.001
--- I--- - -. - -. . .- -. - -- -- ~ - - -- - .- - - - - . -. -
- --a - ---- -.--. ---. - - . - . - . -- -- , - -. -- . ., .. - -.
-- -. . .- .- . . , / _ . _. .. 15"Sprint ---;-_.-. ___ - i.
--~.;__ --- r; ;....--- - , - - . . -r - ~ - - ' - - - . - Correct
I - - . . - - - - - - - -- - -- _ . ~ r . - - . . . , - . - I , .-
-* . - -~ - -
SUCCESSIVE CALENDAR DAYS Carolvn x Dr. M. Merrit x 2nd Grade
SUPERVISOR ADVISER MANAGER BEHAVER AGE LABEL
Dr. M. Sioux Falls Public Dr. M. Dr. M. & Merritt Dr. M
& Merritt Oral Reading
DEPOSITOR AGENCY TIMER COUNTER CHARTER COUNTED
-
no-jump-no-turn in learning opportunities. Merrit's correctly
read word performance acceler- ated by X3.25 while Merrit's
learning opportuni- ties remained stable at XI.
Chris During baseline, Chris correctly read 69
wpm with four errors. Overall, while reading Emma's Dragon Hunt
(Stock, 1987) Chris's perfor- mance shows an accelerating trend for
correctly read words and a slight decreasing trend for in-
correctly read words. Specifically, Chris's overall celeration of
correctly read words was X1.4 celeration. Maintenance is clearly
evident in the number of correctly read words. Chris correctly read
22 more words after a twelve day break. Fur- thermore, during the
final seven days of repeated readings, Chris evidenced a Jaws
learning picture with corrects accelerating by X 1.5 while his
learn- ing opportunities divided by approximately ~2 .25 . Overall,
for the passage Emma's Dragon Hunt, Chris's frequency of correctly
read words im- proved from 69 / 4 to 184 / 0 across 9 sessions.
That represents approximately a tripling (X2.7) of cor- rect
performance.
For the passage Molly the Brave (O'Connor, et al., 1990), across
9 minutes of instruc- tion and practice the number of correctly
read words accelerated by X1.5 while Chris's learning opportunities
remained stable. The passage change produced a jump-down-turn-up in
Chris's corrects and a no-jump-no-turn in errors. Chris's learning
opportunities decelerated by 11.8. The number of correctly read
words per minute im- proved from 75 / 1 to 135 12, representing a
X1.8 improvement in correctly read words. Chris's per- formance
improved substantially across long pe- riods of time without formal
repeated reading practice. For instance, a week passed between each
repeated reading session, yet the number of cor- rectly read words
improved by 28 and 32 words, respectively.
With the introduction of The Relatives Came (Rylant, et al.,
1993) Chris's performance evi- denced a bottoms-up-steeper-slope
with a celeration in corrects of X3.0. Chris's learning op-
portunities decelerated by 16. In nine minutes of instruction and
practice, the frequency of correctly read words improved from 97 /
2 to 128 / 0, repre- senting slightly better than a X1.3 frequency
change.
Cory During baseline, Cory correctly read 55
wpm with one error. Overall, while reading Emma's Dragon Hunt
(Stock, 1987) Cory's perfor- mance shows an accelerating trend for
correctly
read words and a slight decreasing trend for in- correctly read
words. Specifically, Cory's overall celeration of correctly read
words was X1.25 while learning opportunities maintained at approxi-
mately XI. Maintenance is clearly evident in the number of
correctly read words. Cory correctly read 6 more words after a
twelve day break. How- ever, since Cory's correct performance was
flat for three consecutive practice sessions, an untimed reading
procedure was used in an attempt to im- prove Cory's performance.
This program change resulted in a jump-up-no-turn in Cory's correct
performance. A frequency jump in correctly read words occurred with
the introduction of the untimed reading procedure. Cory's correct
perfor- mance improved from 108 / 1 to 13413. Overall, for the
passage Emma's Dragon Hunt, Cory's fre- quency of correctly read
words improved from 55 / 1 to a high of 154/0, a frequency change
of X2.8.
With the introduction of The Relatives Came (Rylant, et al.,
1993) Cory's performance evi- denced a jump-down-turn up in
celeration. Cory's celeration of correctly read words was X6.0
while his learning opportunities decelerated by 15.5. In twelve
minutes of instruction and practice, the fre- quency of Cory's
correctly read words improved from 5314 to 10712. This represents a
X2.0 fre- quency change.
DISCUSSION
The current study's data are consistent with the existing
repeated reading database (O'Shea, et al., 1985; Polk, et al.,
1994; Samuals, 2002; Teigen, et al., 2001). All participant's im-
proved their oral reading performance to varying degrees. The
standard acceptable oral reading flu- ency criterion within the
Precision Teaching litera- ture is 180-200 correctly read words per
minute. The combination of the passage selection criterion and
naturally occurring scheduling changes com- mon to a public school
setting precluded reaching this level of fluency for all
participants on a con- sistent basis. Passages were selected
deliberately to include yet-to-be-read passages in the classroom as
defined by the curriculum scope and sequence. This imposed temporal
limitations for ongoing in- struction for each passage.
Furthermore, partici- pant absences and professional exigencies
pre- cluded more consistent data collection. This said, when an
extended duration of time passed be- tween repeated reading
sessions, all participant's either maintained or improved their
reading per- formance. The only exception being the final re-
peated reading session for Cory during the untimed reading
condition. While inconsistency in instruction may have mitigated
the magnitude
JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
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CALENDAR WEEKS Figure 2: Chris's Correct and Incorrect Oral
Reading Performance
Carolyn SUCCESSIVE CALENDAR DAYS
Dr. M. Chris x 2nd Grade
SUPERVISOR ADVISER MANAGER BEHAVER AGE LABEL
Dr. M. Sioux FallsPublic cob' Dr. M./Chris Dr. M./Chris Oral
Reading
TIMER COUNTER CHARTER COUNTED
-
CALENDAR WEEKS Figure 3: Cory's Correct and Incorrect Oral
Reading Performance
0 4 8 12 16 20 I , , , 1 , 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 , 1 ,
, 1 , 1 , , , , , , 1 , , , 1 1 1 l 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 I I I I I I
I , , , I , , , 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 , , , I , , , , 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 , 1 , 1 , , , , 1 1 1 1 , , , 1 I I , 1 , , I , I I I , 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
Correct
.... :. . . . i- - . PC- -I--. ..... I L i --.-a --I.---.- . .
l.._.__-. .. 2 ...... .. ...... -............................. -
---- . + . - - - - -- - -+ -- - -- - -- . A - - - ... -. . -- .- .
...... I .. . . . 1--- - - - ._-. - -L.-, - - _ - - .-.-.
-. =- I--.:- ,- - .- - ...-. . . . . . . . . -----, .
.-......... .
I
----L 1 ............. _-- ...... .- -- . - L - -55.5 ! 1 1
! ! - ______. . , - . - _ _ _ _ / _ --, -.------- . . - , .. ..
- 1 ........... ..... c . . - 1-. . . . . . . . . . . + . __. - -
,- ---A- I _---- - * -, - -. --
. + ........ .- . . . . . . . ........ .. . . ...... 1 . 2 - , -
- -- - t r - z z r - L - 1 - T r : - - z 1- - ................. ...
....... : ; ,.. - ---- d - - ; - I - -.i
........ ,.. ...... L . . , . . . . . . . . . - L . . .....
......... - ................. .. . . I I
I i - - -- ;- .I I . . . . ...... . . . . . .... - - -- - . . .
. , . . . . . . . . . . . . / . .- _* . . . . . . . . , ., _-_ _ _
- 1 - I
I I 1 -----
i I i-- -
_I --- * - - L . --. .- . - . - . - .. -- .... - -. . . . . -
... + .... ....... - - - _ -.._..I-._3_ _._ __! _ . . a - __ _-
_
--
-
of effects of the repeated reading procedure, it also provided
maintenance probes within a naturally occurring context.
Limitations, however, need to be addressed.
Procedural modifications needed to be made for Cory and Merrit.
For each, relatively flat data paths dictated the need for an
instructional change to improve their performance. For Merrit, the
15" sprint was used to mitigate the effect of a difficult portion
of the passage while for Cory, the untimed reading procedure was
used to improve overall performance. Both instructional modifica-
tions achieved their intended objective.
Due to temporal constraints imposed by the scope and sequence of
instruction, standard fluency ranges for oral reading (180-200 wpm)
could not be established consistently for each pas- sage. It is
very likely that had reading performance been achieved within this
fluency range, improved acquisition and generalization of reading
perfor- mance would have been realized for all learners. This may
have been a particularly crucial variable for Cory. Cory attained
performance levels notice- ably lower compared with Merrit and
Chris. For instance, Cory's highest performance for Emma's Dragon
Hunt was 15410 while Merrit and Chris achieved high performances of
179 / 0 and 184 / 0 respectively. Further, due to scheduling
conflicts, Cory did not experience the repeated readings procedure
for "Molly the Brave". This precludes a direct comparison with
Chris and Merrit's perfor- mance on this passage. However, a
celeration analysis reveals some interesting comparisons across
participants.
Celeration values for "Emma's Dragon Hunt" were relatively
comparable across students. Merrit and Cory's baseline performance
were com- parable, 59 / 6 and 55 / 1 respectively. Both made
comparable progress with celerations of X1.25. Comparatively,
Chris's baseline performance was 6914 and evidenced steeper slopes,
X1.5, com- pared to Merrit and Cory. An interesting distinc- tion
arose with the introduction of "The Relatives Came". While Merrit
and Chris evidenced higher overall performance levels, Cory's
celeration of correctly read words was virtually twice that of
Merrit's and Chris's. With the elimination of tem- poral
constraints, it is possible that Cory's perfor- mance could have
reached that comparable to Chris's and Merrit's. Comparing total
instruction time within each passage provides an additional
dimension of analysis of performances.
For "Emma's Dragon", Cory and Merrit's performances were
comparable after ten sessions or 30 minutes of repeated reading
instruction, 1541 0 and 155 / O respectively. Chris received 9
sessions or 27 minutes of instruction and practice but
achieved overall higher performance rates. Com- paratively, for
"The Relatives Came" passage, Merrit's oral reading rate after 9
minutes of instruc- tion and practice was 12410 while Chris's was
128 / 0. Cory's performance, after 3 additional minutes of repeated
reading instruction and practice was 1071 2. While analyzing
individual performances is a static rather than dynamic analysis,
it may be useful to correlate, within the overall context of
frequency, celeration, and bounce change analy- ses, performance
levels with actual practice time. When compared with other students
at the same age and grade level, this may provide a useful cur-
riculum-based normative assessment of student performances and may
provide a more direct mea- sure of identifying students who are
potentially at risk for reading failure.
One of the goals of the current study, and the basis for passage
selection, was to increase the likelihood of transfer from the
repeated readings sessions to the regular education classroom. From
a social validity perspective, both Merrit's and Cory and Chris's
teacher reported improved read- ing performance during language
arts instruction. Both teachers reported more fluid levels of read-
ing indicated by less hesitations and fewer errors. Merrit's
teacher reported improved fluency and an increased frequency of
volunteering to read in class, something he was previously
unwilling to do.
Future repeated readings research might focus on investigating
the relationship between amount of practice time and performance
levels achieved when compared with peers. For instance, what is the
performance difference among stu- dents already receiving Title 1
services (i.e., already identified as at risk for a reading
disability) with students not receiving such services and identi-
fied as average readers? To what extent do com- parable
performances across passages differ among students in different
educational demo- graphics such as Title 1, Mild Mental
Retardation, Learning Disabilities and regular education? Could
curriculum-based comparisons such as those displayed on the
Standard Celeration Chart provide predictive utility for student's
who may be at risk for future failure and provide a reliable
indicator for early intervention? Answers to these questions may
provide educators with a quick, reliable assessment tool by which
to make accu- rate educational decisions for early intervention
that may obviate the need for special education services.
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JOURNAL OF PRECISION TEACHING AND CELERATION, VOLUME 19, NUMBER
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Celeration of Publication Frequency*
Michael Lamport Commons Harvard Medical School
This study examines the publication history of the author using
celeration charting. Some possible naturalistic contingencies were
suggested that may account for the changes in the overall rate of
pub- lication and the specific increase in publishing in journals.
These were moving to a research univer- sity, the use of computers,
and collaborating with and getting help from seasoned researchers.
Ex- plicit academic promotion contingencies explain switch to
publishing more in journals.
DESCRIPTORS: Celeration, Charting, Contingencies, Publication,
Frequency, Rate, Journals, Ad- vancement, Academia
Because of tenure issues, there always seems to be interest in
the publication rates of fac- ulty at institutions of higher
education. In psychol- ogy, much of the research on this topic is
devoted to the identification of individuals and institutions that
have the highest publication rates in major journals ( Cox &
Catt, 1977, Howard et. al., 1987; Jones et. al., 1982; Smith et.
al., 1998; Smith et. al., 2003; Webster et. al., 1993). In
addition, several studies have attempted to determine the factors
that may affect a researcher's productivity ( Bernardin, 1996;
Kiewra & Creswell, 2000; Allison & Long 1990). Yet, with
the exception of B. F. Skinner's cumulative record of his
publication his- tory, no studies were found that systematically
charted and examined the publication history of an individual
researcher. This type of study could be important because it may
elucidate determi- nants of publication rate that are yet to be
explored.
In this paper, the author will examine his own publication
record through the use of an Count per Year Standard Celeration